Heartland International Film Festival titles make Academy Awards history!
Films featured at the 28th Heartland International Film Festival (October 10-20, 2019) made history at the 92nd Academy Awards®.
Bong Joon-Ho’s “Parasite” (NEON) became the first Best International Feature Film category winner to also win Best Picture, and was the first South Korean film to win in any of the categories in addition to Achievement in Directing and Original Screenplay.
Writer/Director Taika Waititi also made history as the first Indigenous director to win an Academy Award for “Jojo Rabbit” (Searchlight Pictures) in the Adapted Screenplay category. HIFF Centerpiece title “Marriage Story” earned Netflix its first acting honor as Laura Dern won for Actress in a Supporting Role.
“Heartland Film wishes to congratulate all the winners at last night’s Academy Awards,” said Heartland Film President Craig Prater. “A special thank you to those history-making filmmakers who made this year’s Heartland International Film Festival the biggest and best yet. It was an astounding year at the movies and we look forward to building on this momentum for the 3rd Indy Shorts International Film Festival in July and the 29th Heartland International Film Festival in October.”
“Parasite” was one of 15 films featured at HIFF in the “Best International Feature Film Oscar® Contenders” program. The program in its third year featured titles just confirmed as their country’s respective entry for the Academy Awards®.
Among the 15 titles programmed, three were eventually nominated by the Academy, including “Honeyland” (NEON) and “Pain and Glory” (Sony Pictures Classics). HIFF plans to expand the category to 30 titles in 2020 and will be among the first festival destinations in the world to showcase the newly-announced films at the 29th HIFF (October 8-18, 2020).
In addition to films featured at HIFF, winners of Heartland Film’s rolling industry honor, the Truly Moving Picture Award, won a combined seven Academy Awards®. “1917” (NBCUniversal) took home wins in the Achievement in Cinematography, Sound Mixing, and Visual Effects categories. “American Factory” (Netflix) took home Best Documentary Feature while “Little Women” (Sony Pictures Entertainment) won Achievement in Costume Design, “Toy Story 4” (Disney-Pixar) won Best Animated Feature, and “Bombshell” (Lionsgate) won Achievement in Makeup & Hairstyling.
“Heartland Film would like to congratulate all the winners and nominees,” said Heartland Film Artistic Director Greg Sorvig. “The historic win for ‘Parasite’ extends Heartland Film’s streak of showcasing best picture or short film winners at Heartland Film festivals for the sixth year running.”
Heartland Film will present an encore screening of “Parasite” as part of its “Best of the Fest” four-film mini-fest at The Historic Artcraft Theater in Franklin, Indiana, on Saturday, March 7 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are now available at historicartcrafttheatre.org
Heartland Film’s Indy Shorts International Film Festival (July 21-26, 2020) is an Academy Award®-qualifying festival in the Live Action and Documentary Short Subject categories at the annual Academy Awards. The winner of Indy Shorts’ Grand Prize for Best Narrative and Documentary Shorts qualify for the Academy Awards® granted they meet all other submission requirements. Both 2019 qualifiers, “Brotherhood” and “St. Louis Superman” were nominated along with Finalist titles “In the Absence” and “Sister.” Since 2009, 7 short films programmed by Heartland Film have won Academy Awards®, with a total of 23 nominations.
Photo courtesy: oscars.com